Pot Kettle Black

Remember this meme shoved into the discussion of the 2000 Presidential election by Dear Leader's campaign.

Despite Pentagon assurances that all of the U.S. Army's divisions are "fit to fight and ready to deploy," Republican presidential nominee George W. Bush refused Friday to concede that the U.S. military is combat-ready.

"No, I would not concede that necessarily," Bush told CNN's Candy Crowley on his campaign train headed toward Akron, Ohio. "I'm amazed that they would put out a statement right after our convention.

The U.S. Army said Friday that Bush was wrong when he said in his speech Thursday night to the Republican National Convention that two of the Army's 10 divisions were not ready to fight.

[...]

But Maj. Thomas Collins, an Army spokesman, told CNN: "All 10 Army divisions are combat-ready, fully able to meet their war-fighting mission."

It was a non-issue, as were/are many of the issues proffered by the Republicans to try to drive wedges into campaigns. Well, it seems things have come full circle, as noted by Tim Grieve over at Salon's War Room:

Even as the Pentagon considers sending additional troops to Iraq, the Washington Post reports that the wars there and in Afghanistan have taken such a toll on tanks, Bradley Fighting Vehicles, helicopters and Humvees that many U.S. military units are now rated as "unready" to deploy.

Lt. Col. Mike Johnson said that, in the old days, if a unit was rated as less than "C-1," or fully ready, "someone would get fired." Now, he says, having units with substandard equipment is just an accepted part of life during wartime. "It's a cost of continuous operations," Johnson told the Post. "You can't be ready all the time."